Many Korean words can also be written using Chinese characters, known as '''hanja''' in Korean. These are still occasionally seen in newspapers, formal documents and official signs, but are in general rarely used and have even been completely abolished in North Korea. While they remain official in South Korea, their use is largely restricted to the elderly, and many youths are unable to recognize even their own names written in '''hanja'''. The few times when they still show up is in brackets to describe an unfamiliar term or distinguish a term from another similar word.

+

Many Korean words can also be written using Chinese characters, known as '''hanja''' in Korean. These are still occasionally seen in newspapers, formal documents and official signs, but are in general rarely used and have even been completely abolished in North Korea. While they remain official in South Korea, their use is largely restricted to the elderly, and many youths are unable to recognize anything more than their own names written in '''hanja'''. The few times when they still show up is in brackets next to the hangul to describe an unfamiliar term, to distinguish a term from another similar word or as a form of bold face when mentioning personal or place names. Hanja are also still used to mark Korean chess, or ''janggi'' pieces.

It is worth noting that while Chinese characters are seldom written, many words themselves are Chinese words simply written as how they are pronounced -- not according to the Mandarin pronounciation, but according to the standardized Korean pronounciation of those same Chinese characters used in China. Like the position of Latin in English and French, Chinese words are often found in the more formal and less vernacular sciences, and even more so with 19th-century new Chinese words coined by the Japanese, and used in both Korea and China. Japanese, Vietnamese, and Chinese speakers may find some familiarity with some of these overlapping Chinese terms, although pronounciations are slightly different and Koreans only write out sounds and not the original Chinese characters. Although not nearly as much as Cantonese, Korean pronounciation of Chinese words retain more medieval Chinese pronounciations of the Tang dynasty some 1300 years ago, than the Manchurian-influenced modern Mandarin.

It is worth noting that while Chinese characters are seldom written, many words themselves are Chinese words simply written as how they are pronounced -- not according to the Mandarin pronounciation, but according to the standardized Korean pronounciation of those same Chinese characters used in China. Like the position of Latin in English and French, Chinese words are often found in the more formal and less vernacular sciences, and even more so with 19th-century new Chinese words coined by the Japanese, and used in both Korea and China. Japanese, Vietnamese, and Chinese speakers may find some familiarity with some of these overlapping Chinese terms, although pronounciations are slightly different and Koreans only write out sounds and not the original Chinese characters. Although not nearly as much as Cantonese, Korean pronounciation of Chinese words retain more medieval Chinese pronounciations of the Tang dynasty some 1300 years ago, than the Manchurian-influenced modern Mandarin.

Depending on which part of Korea you go to different dialects of Korean are spoken. The standard in South Korea is based on the Seoul dialect, which is spoken in Seoul and Gyeonggi province as well as the city of Kaesong in North Korea, while the standard in North Korea is based on the Pyongan dialect, which is spoken in Pyongyang as well as North and South Pyongan provinces. Other dialects include the Gyeongsang dialect spoken in Busan, Daegu, Ulsan and the provinces of North and South Gyeongsang, the Jeju dialect spoken on the island of Jeju, and the Hamgyong dialect spoken in North and South Hamgyong provinces, as well as by most of the ethnic Korean minority in China. This guide is based on the standard in South Korea.

Grammar

Korean sentence structure is very similar to that of Japanese, so speakers of Japanese will find many aspects of Korean grammar familiar, and Korean speakers likewise with Japanese. But there are similar but slight differences to the standardized pronounciations, and the Korean language, even after its simplification in the past century, has a wider library of vowels and consonants than Japanese, hence Japanese speakers may find it difficult to pronounce various words, let alone transcribe them.

Korean word order is subject-object-verb: "I-subject him-object see-verb." Subjects (especially I and you) are often omitted if these are clear from the context. This may seem awkward from an English perspective, but English too has colloquial 1st-person/2nd-person subject omissions, such as "[Are you] Done yet?" or "[I'm] Done." It is a matter of whether sentences are common enough that such lack of subjects doesn't confuse the listener. In turn, some English colloquial sentences without subjects may be confusing from a Korean standpoint.

There are no articles, genders, or declensions. It has extensive verb conjugations indicating tense and honorific level. There is a handy, universal plural form, but it is very often omitted.

Koreans refer to each other rather in terms like elder brother, elder sister, younger sibling, uncle, aunt, grandmother, grandfather, manager, teacher etc. (like Nepalese or Chinese) than by using the word you. Additionally, it's not uncommon to refer to yourself by using such an expression ( example: "[I] Father will cook you a nice dinner." Which feels like saying "This father will..."). You can also call somebody an aunt, uncle or brother even if this person is actually not. Many Korean girls call even their boyfriend "oppa" (older brother).

Depending on the relation to the person you have conversation with, it's necessary to find the correct level of formality and politeness. If the person is considered to be higher in the hierarchy, a very polite and formal form has to be used, while this person will use a more "vernacular" form to address you as a lower person. Koreans often ask very personal questions (about your age, occupation, family status etc.) in order to find out in which form they should use when talking to you. This phrasebook assumes the highest formality level in most cases. Not only are words conjugated according to 6 existing levels of formality (but 2 are becoming unused), but a few words will also be replaced with different words altogether. Extremely formal places will often use some Chinese postal words as well.

Pronunciation guide

The good news is unlike Chinese, Korean is not tonal, so you don't need to worry about changing your pitch to get the meaning right. The bad news is that Korean has a few too many vowels for comfort and small distinctions between many consonants, so pronouncing things exactly right is still a bit of a challenge.

This phrasebook uses the Revised Romanization of Korean, which is overwhelmingly the most popular system in South Korea. The McCune-Reischauer romanization, used in North Korea and older South Korean texts, is noted in parentheses when different.

Vowels

Korean vowels can be short or long, but this is not indicated in writing and the distinction rarely if ever affects meaning. (example: 밤 bam, pronounced short means "night", pronounced long means "chestnut")

a ㅏ

like 'a' in "father"

o ㅗ

like 'o' in "tone"

eo (ŏ) ㅓ

like the "uh" in "lust"

u ㅜ

A low sound of "oo" as in "hoop". "woo" (Korean does not distinguish between "oo" and "woo").

eu (ŭ) ㅡ

like 'i' in "cousin", "dozen". Like the Turkish "ı". Kind of similar to the french "eu", but as a clearer, purer vowel sound.

i ㅣ

like the 'i' in "ship" (short) OR the 'ee' in "sheep" (long)

e ㅔ

like the 'e' in "bed"

ae ㅐ

similar to the "a" in "hand", "valve", "gas", and "can"

note: ㅐ ae is now virtually identically pronounced as ㅔ e. Only rare words are unconsciously pronounced differently like they were half a century ago ("애", or "child" is one such remnant).

Common diphthongs

Korean has two standalone diphthongs:

oe ㅚ

like 'we' in 'west' (it used to be a different sound, now prounounced the same as ㅞ shown below)

ui ㅢ

like 'ŭ' + 'i'

In addition, most vowels can be modified by prefixing them with 'y' or 'w':

wa ㅘ

like 'wa' sound in "suave"

wae ㅙ

like 'wa' in "wagon". Some would argue there is virtually no difference anymore to ㅞ.

wo ㅝ

like 'wuh' sound in "wonder"

wi ㅟ

like "we" or 'e' in "she" with rounded lips

we ㅞ

like 'we' in "west"

ya ㅑ

like 'ya' in "yard"

yo ㅛ

like 'yo' in "yosemite" or "New York". Not like "yaw" or "yoke".

yeo (yŏ) ㅕ

like 'you' in "young"

yu ㅠ

like "you"

ye ㅖ

like 'ye' in "yes"

yae ㅒ

like 'ye' in "yes"; its virtually assimiliated to be the same as 'ㅖ'

to summarize the assimiliated vowel diphthongs mentioned above,

ㅙ = ㅚ = ㅞ = 'we' in "west"
ㅖ = ㅒ = 'ye' in "yes"

Consonants

Most Korean consonants come in three versions, namely unaspirated (without a puff of air), aspirated (with a puff of air) and tensed (stressed). Unaspirated consonants exist in English too, but never alone: compare the sound of 'p' in "pot" (aspirated) and "spot" (unaspirated). Many English speakers find it helpful to pronounce an imperceptible little "m" in front to 'stop' the puff. Tensing isn't really found in English, but pronouncing the consonant quick and hard is a reasonable substitute.

b (p) ㅂ

like 'p' in "spit" (unaspirated)

p (p', ph) ㅍ

like 'p' in "pig" (aspirated)

pp ㅃ

tensed 'p', like 'p' in "petit" in French

d (t) ㄷ

like 't' in "stab" (unaspirated)

t (t', th) ㅌ

like 't' in "top" (aspirated)

tt ㄸ

tensed 't'

g (k) ㄱ

like 'k' in "skate" (unaspirated)

k (k', k) ㅋ

like 'c' in "cat" (aspirated)

kk ㄲ

tensed 'k'

j (ch) ㅈ

like 'g' in "gin" (unaspirated)

ch (ch') ㅊ

like 'ch' in "chin" (aspirated). Usually pronounced as a light aspiratd 't' as a final consonant

jj ㅉ

tensed 'j'

s ㅅ

like 's' in "soon", 'sh' before i or any "y" dipthong. Usually pronounced as a very light 't' as a final consonant

ss ㅆ

tensed 's', 's' in 'sea', never 'sh'

Standalone consonants:

n ㄴ

like 'n' in "nice"

m ㅁ

like 'm' in "mother"

l ㄹ

somewhere between 'l', 'r' and 'n', original sound is 'r' or 'l'. and 'n' sound occurs through initial consonant mutation.

h ㅎ

like 'h' in "help"

ng ㅇ

like 'ng' in "sing". Unpronounced (placeholder) when at the start of a syllable.

While the rules above are usually correct for the first consonant, those in the middle of a word are usually (but not always) voiced, which means that ㅂㄷㅈㄱ turn into English "b", "d", "j" and "k". The best rule of thumb is to concentrate on remembering that the first consonant is "special" and the rest are more or less as in English: bibimbap (비빔밥) is pronounced "pee-bim-bap", not "bee-bim-bap" or "p'ee-bim-bap".

The aspirated spellings with "h" are used only in the official North Korean orthography.

Loanwords

Native Korean words can end only in vowels or the consonants k, l, m, n, ng, p or s, and any words imported into Korean are shoehorned to fit this pattern, usually by padding any errant consonants with the vowel eu (ㅡ). For example, any English word ending in "t" will be pronounced as teu (트) in Korean, eg. Baeteumaen (배트맨) for "Batman". In addition, the English sound "f" is turned into p and has that vowel tacked on, so "golf" becomes golpeu (골프).

Written language

A wise man can acquaint himself with them before the morning is over; a stupid man can learn them in the space of ten days.--King Sejong on hangul

Korean is generally written using a native alphabet known as hangul (chosongul in North Korea and China). Designed by a committee and rather scary-looking at first, it's in fact a very logical alphabetic writing system far simpler than Chinese characters or even the Japanese kana syllabary, and it's well worth putting in the time to learn them if staying in Korea for more than a day or two.

The basic idea is simple: hangul consists of letters called jamo combined into square blocks, where each block represents a syllable. The block is always in the order (consonant)-vowel-(consonant), stacked from top to bottom, where ㅇ is used as the first jamo if the first consonant is missing, and the space for the last consonant can be left empty is missing. For example, the word Seoul (서울) consists of the syllables seo (ㅅ s plus ㅓ eo, no final consonant) and ul (ㅇ plus ㅜ u plus ㄹ l). Tensed consonants are created by doubling the jamo
(ㅅ s → ㅆ ss) and y-vowel diphthongs have an extra dash tacked on (ㅏ a → ㅑ ya). And that's pretty much it!

Many Korean words can also be written using Chinese characters, known as hanja in Korean. These are still occasionally seen in newspapers, formal documents and official signs, but are in general rarely used and have even been completely abolished in North Korea. While they remain official in South Korea, their use is largely restricted to the elderly, and many youths are unable to recognize anything more than their own names written in hanja. The few times when they still show up is in brackets next to the hangul to describe an unfamiliar term, to distinguish a term from another similar word or as a form of bold face when mentioning personal or place names. Hanja are also still used to mark Korean chess, or janggi pieces.

It is worth noting that while Chinese characters are seldom written, many words themselves are Chinese words simply written as how they are pronounced -- not according to the Mandarin pronounciation, but according to the standardized Korean pronounciation of those same Chinese characters used in China. Like the position of Latin in English and French, Chinese words are often found in the more formal and less vernacular sciences, and even more so with 19th-century new Chinese words coined by the Japanese, and used in both Korea and China. Japanese, Vietnamese, and Chinese speakers may find some familiarity with some of these overlapping Chinese terms, although pronounciations are slightly different and Koreans only write out sounds and not the original Chinese characters. Although not nearly as much as Cantonese, Korean pronounciation of Chinese words retain more medieval Chinese pronounciations of the Tang dynasty some 1300 years ago, than the Manchurian-influenced modern Mandarin.

Phrase list

Phrases in this section are not consistently transcribed with Revised Romanization of Korean and Wikitravel's romanization guidelines. If you are familiar with the language, please help fix them up!

Phrase list

Common signs

열림 (yeollim)

Open

닫힘 (dot-heem)

Closed

입구 (ipgu)

Entrance

출구 (chulgu)

Exit

미시오 (mishio)

Push

당기시오 (dangishio)

Pull

화장실 (hwajangshil)

Toilet

남 (nam)

Men

여 (yeo)

Women

금지 (geumji)

Forbidden

Basics

Hello. (formal)

안녕 하십니까. (annyeong hasimnikka) Common in North Korea, provincial South Korea.

Hello. (very formal)

안녕합니다. (annyeonghamnida) Rarely used,, extremely polite.

Hello. (formal)

안녕하세요. (annyeonghaseyo) Common in South Korea. to older people or to the people you meet first

Numbers

Korean has two sets of numbers, namely native Korean numbers and Sino-Korean numbers (which are borrowed from Chinese). Both come in handy, but in a pinch, the Sino-Korean series is more important to learn.

Sino-Korean numbers

Sino-Korean numbers are used for amounts of currency, telephone numbers, the 24-hour clock and counting minutes.

0

공 (gong) / 영 (yeong)

1

일 (il)

2

이 (i)

3

삼 (sam)

4

사 (sa)

5

오 (o)

6

육 (yuk)

7

칠 (chil)

8

팔 (pal)

9

구 (gu)

10

십 (sip)

11

십일 (sibil)

12

십이 (sibi)

13

십삼 (sipsam)

14

십사 (sipsa)

15

십오 (sibo)

16

십육 (simyuk)

17

십칠 (sipchil)

18

십팔 (sippal)

19

십구 (sipgu)

20

이십 (isip)

21

이십일 (isibil)

22

이십이 (isibi)

23

이십삼 (isipsam)

30

삼십 (samsip)

40

사십 (sasip)

50

오십 (osip)

60

육십 (yuksip)

70

칠십 (chilsip)

80

팔십 (palsip)

90

구십 (gusip)

100

백 (baek)

200

이백 (ibaek)

300

삼백 (sambaek)

1,000

천 (cheon)

2,000

이천 (icheon)

10,000

만 (man)

100,000

십만 (simman)

1,000,000 (one million)

백만 (baengman)

10,000,000

천만 (cheonman)

100,000,000

억 (eok)

1,000,000,000 (one billion)

십억 (sibeok)

10,000,000,000

백억 (baegeok)

100,000,000,000

천억 (cheoneok)

1,000,000,000,000 (one trillion)

조 (jo)

10,000,000,000,000

십조 (sipjo)

100,000,000,000,000

백조 (baekjo)

1,000,000,000,000,000

천조 (chunjo)

10,000,000,000,000,000

경 (gyeong)

number _____ (train, bus, etc.)

_____ 번 (열차, 버스, etc.) (beon (yeolcha, beoseu, etc.))

half

반 (ban)

less

덜 (deol)

more

더 (deo)

Native Korean numbers

Native Korean numbers are used for hours and with counting words.

Counting words
When counting objects, Korean uses special counter words. For example, "two beers" is maekju dubyeong (맥주 2병), where du is "two" and -byeong means "bottles". There are many counters, but the most useful ones are myeong (명) for people, jang (장) for papers including tickets, and gae (개) for pretty much anything else (which is not always strictly correct, but will usually be understood and is growing in colloquial usage).

objects (apples, sweets)

개 -gae

people

명 -myeong, 분 -bun (polite)

flat paper-like objects (papers, tickets, pages)

장 -jang

bottles (or other glass or ceramic containers for liquid with a narrow mouth)

병 -byeong

cups, glasses

잔 -jan

animals

마리 -mari

times

번 -beon

machines (cars, computers)

대 -dae

long objects (pens, rifles)

자루 -jaru

small boxes

갑 -gap

books

권 -gwon

large boxes

상자 -sangja

trees

그루 -geuru

letters, telegrams, phone calls, e-mails

통 -tong

boats

척 -cheok

bunches of things such as flowers

송이 -song-i

Note that when combined with a counting word, the last letter of numbers 1 through 4 as well as 20 is dropped: one person is hanmyeong (hana+myeong), two tickets is dujang (dul+jang), three things is segae (set+gae), four things is negae (net+gae), twenty things is seumugae (seumul+gae).

1

하나 (hana)

2

둘 (dul)

3

셋 (set)

4

넷 (net)

5

다섯 (daseot)

6

여섯 (yeoseot)

7

일곱 (ilgop)

8

여덟 (yeodeol)

9

아홉 (ahop)

10

열 (yeol)

11

열하나 (yeolhana)

20

스물 (seumul)

30

서른 (seoreun)

40

마흔 (maheun)

50

쉰 (swin)

60

예순 (yesun)

70

일흔 (ilheun)

80

여든 (yeodeun)

90

아흔 (aheun)

Numbers above 100 are always counted with Sino-Korean numbers.

Time

now

지금 (jigeum)

later

나중에 (najung-e)

before

전에 (jeone)

after

후에 (hu-e)

morning

아침 (achim)

afternoon

오후 (ohu)

evening

저녁 (jeonyeok)

night

밤 (bam)

Clock time

one o'clock AM

오전 한 시 (ojeon hansi)

two o'clock AM

오전 두 시 (ojeon dusi)

noon

정오 (jeong-o)

one o'clock PM

오후 한 시 (ohu hansi)

two o'clock PM

오후 두 시 (ohu dusi)

midnight

자정 (jajeong)

Duration

_____ minute(s)

_____ 분 (___ bun)

_____ hour(s)

_____ 시간 (___ sigan)

_____ day(s)

_____ 일 (___ il)

_____ week(s)

_____ 주 (___ ju)

_____ month(s)

_____ 달 (___ dal)

_____ year(s)

_____ 년 (___ nyeon)

Days

today

오늘 (oneul)

yesterday

어제 (eoje)

tomorrow

내일 (nae-il)

this week

이번 주 (ibeon ju)

last week

지난 주 (jinan ju)

next week

다음 주 (da-eum ju)

Sunday

일요일 (ilyoil)

Monday

월요일 (wolyoil)

Tuesday

화요일 (hwayoil)

Wednesday

수요일 (suyoil)

Thursday

목요일 (mogyoil)

Friday

금요일 (geumyoil)

Saturday

토요일 (toyoil)

Months

The names of the months in Korean are simply the Sino-Korean numbers 1 through 12 followed by the word 월 (month).

January

1월 (일월) ilwol

February

2월 (이월) iwol

March

3월 (삼월) samwol

April

4월 (사월) sawol

May

5월 (오월) owol

June*

6월 (유월) yuwol

July

7월 (칠월) chilwol

August

8월 (팔월) palwol

September

9월 (구월) guwol

October*

10월 (시월) siwol

November

11월 (십일월) sibilwol

December

12월 (십이월) sibiwol

The number component of 6월 and 10월 drop the final consonant for purposes of liaison.